


her ladder to the stars

by aceofdiamonds



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-05
Updated: 2015-10-05
Packaged: 2018-04-24 23:45:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4938541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aceofdiamonds/pseuds/aceofdiamonds
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a year on from the final battle the weasleys mourn fred as they welcome a new addition to the family</p>
            </blockquote>





	her ladder to the stars

**Author's Note:**

> title is a slightly altered lyric from timshel by mumford and sons

 

Victoire Weasley comes into the world one year on from the Final Battle of Hogwarts. The afternoon is hot and long, heat simmering through the windows of St. Mungo's, a sweat breaking across Fleur’s forehead the second she wakes in the morning.

She is born on this day that before has held so much sadness for the entirety of the wizarding world and so her birth brings a burst of hope and happiness that a lot of people had forgotten about.

The day Victoire is born Fleur barely has a second to catch her breath before the Weasleys flood the room. Molly sits herself beside the bed and holds her arms out, tears already brimming over. It's been an emotional day since Fleur rolled out of bed this morning, heart heavy with the memory of lost lives and belly heavy with the promise of a new one, and now she is glad to be able to show her mother-in-law that eventually things will get better.   
  
"Meet Victoire," she says, placing her tiny beautiful baby daughter into Molly's hands.   
  
"Oh, she's wonderful," Molly sighs after a good long look. "Look, Arthur," she says, raising her arms slightly to show off the baby to Arthur peering over her shoulder. "Isn't she beautiful?"

Arthur produces a handkerchief from his pocket, passing it around the room to those in need, all the while refusing the take his eyes off of his new granddaughter. “I can’t think of a better word.”   
  
Ginny moves forward, a hand on her mother's shoulder to balance her as she leans in. "Luckily she got your looks, Fleur," she observes, laughing when Bill elbows her in the ribs. "Hey, maybe the next one will be ginger."   
  
"Next one," Fleur gasps. "I've only just had this one," but she knows she wants as many as possible. She has always loved her family, the small inclusive group of her mother and father and Gabrielle, but there is something so wonderful and lively within the Weasley's sprawling family tree. She wants to join the two families with as many branches as can fit.   
  
"You're a Weasley now, Fleur," George pipes up from over by the door. "Haven't you noticed they tend to churn them out every couple of years?” He smiles at her then, a gesture that isn’t lost in the room focused on Fleur, because smiles from George are monthly occasions, if that, and to see one today is enough to have Fleur blinking rapidly as she returns the smile.   
  


 

.

  
  
After the Weasleys leave, Bill with them with promises to bring clean clothes as soon as he has Flooed her parents, Fleur tips her head back against her pillow, baby in arms, and takes a deep breath again. She's exhausted; the labour had stretched on for hours and hours, ripping apart her body little by little until suddenly after one huge push Victoire had slid out of her and into the Healer's waiting hands. She's so tired her head is buzzing but she refuses to close her eyes in case she misses anything. Every second that passes her daughter is getting more used to the world, more used to her body and how it works, and Fleur won’t miss any of that for the world, sleep be damned.   
  
It's a surprise when she allows her eyes to drift shut for half of a second and she opens them to see Harry sitting in the chair by her bed.   
  
"Sorry," he says immediately. "I didn't want to wake you."  
  
"It's fine," she promises. "I don’t want to sleep -- I don’t want to miss anything."

“How are you?” he asks, nudging his glasses up his nose from where the heat of the day has caused them to slip.

“Tired,” she replies, stifling the yawn threatening to overwhelm her.

“Sorry for coming by so late; practice ran on and I couldn’t get away.”

“Quidditch waits for no one,” Fleur murmurs, smiling slightly. “I should count myself lucky my waters didn’t break during a match.” Harry’s face twists at the mention of biological gruesome parts of labour the same way half the room did earlier when Molly was asking her for all the details. “It was nice of you to come, Harry.”   
￼  
"I've never seen a baby this close up before. Teddy was a few months older by the time I met him -- not as scary as this."  
  
"Would you like to hold her?" Fleur offers.   
  
"Oh, no, I don't know anything about babies."  
  
She smiles. "How do you know if you've never seen one before?"  
  
"That's true," Harry agrees, and then he smiles tentatively. "Sorry, Ron forgot to mention the name when he owled me."   
  
Fleur sits up straighter so she can hold out her daughter. When Harry takes her she snuffles, squirming, and he freezes momentarily before relaxing and settling her into his arms.   
  
"She's called Victoire," Fleur tells him.   
  
"Victoire," Harry repeats, trying it out. "Very nice."  
  
"It means victory in French," she says, still finding it odd after all these years to have to cross between her two languages like this.   
  
"Oh." Harry nods, eyes caught on Victoire's waving hand. Making sure she's secure on his arm he tentatively holds out a finger. Victoire doesn't grab it right away but Fleur knows from the five short hours she's known her daughter that she'll reach out and take it eventually. "That's an appropriate name for today," he says after a long moment.   
  
"It was Bill's idea."   
  
"It was a good idea," Harry agrees.   
  
It's quiet for a while after that. Fleur allows herself to close her eyes again. Soon, Bill will come back and she'll fall asleep, content that her daughter has a parent watching over her. She’s trusted Harry since she was seventeen and he rescued Gabrielle from the merpeople but she’s a mother now and for the first couple of days she’s not trusting her daughter with anyone, not even the Savior of the wizarding world. 

So she lies there, eyes closed but still alert, and Harry sits beside her, and the silence is much more comfortable than Fleur could ever have predicted. She realises then that she and Harry have gone through a lot together. When she first met him at the Triwizard Tournament she had vague memories about being told about this boy who survived _Avada Kedavra_ but Britain had always seemed so far away from the South of France and so she hadn’t given him much thought. She remembers thinking how small and quiet he had been, so young compared to the rest of them. But he had been strong, often beating her in the tasks, and then he had saved Gabrielle and she felt she owed him everything. She supposes, in some sort of way, it had been Harry who had introduced Bill to her life; if he hadn’t been in the Tournament then Bill and Molly wouldn’t have come to the Third Task and he and Fleur might never had met. She supposes, then, if you look at it in an abstract sort of way, she owes Harry all of her happiness.

Of course after that everything exploded and happiness lost its meaning for a while.

Harry had been at her wedding and then he had been at her house, broken and full of grief, secrets locked up inside of him so tight he could do nothing more than force himself to sit upright at the dinner table and make vague compliments about her cooking each night. And then he had disappeared, taking Hermione, Ron, and that awful goblin with him, and the next time she saw him the war had been won but Fred was dead.

In the aching chaos that followed, Fleur threw herself into the running of the Burrow, helping out wherever she could while the rest of the family tried to come to terms with being one son, one brother, down. She, Harry, and Hermione had been the ones hovering on the outside, devastated themselves, but not staggering under the force of grief the rest of the family were struggling to bear.

When Fleur announced her pregnancy she had approached Harry about spending time with Teddy, the godson who spent weekends with Harry and the rest of the time with his grandmere. It had been fun, spending a couple of afternoons a month in Shell Cottage with Teddy crawling around the floor after Bill, the three of them pretending to be a family in preparation for the real thing.

“Merci for Teddy,” she says now, words slurring as her accent thickens through exhaustion.

Harry looks up from where he has been staring at Victoire. She’s sleeping again, little chest rising and falling with quick breaths, but the Healer said she’ll wake in a couple of hours looking for more food. “No problem, Fleur,” and then he sits up straighter in the chair, “Would you like her back?”

But she likes lying here, being able to see her daughter, and so she shakes her head. “Bill will be here soon.”

  
  


.

  
  


The next time Fleur opens her eyes it's dark outside and Harry is gone. When she turns her head she sees Bill sitting there instead, arms folded across his chest and head lolling back against the chair.

"Bill," she whispers, reaching out to nudge him. When he doesn't move she repeats it, this time louder and harder. "Bill, _wake up_."

"Ow," he mumbles, "stop hitting me -- oh, Fleur, you're awake, how are you?"

"Where's Victoire?" she asks before kissing him hello.

Bill points over to the small cot in between the bed and the wall where their daughter is sleeping. When Fleur lets out a whoosh of stupid relief he runs a hand over her hair, pressing another kiss to her cheek. "How are you feeling?"

"Sore," she says honestly, shifting and then wincing. "How long have you been here?"

"Couple of hours. Harry stayed until I got here -- said something about your worry about the baby going unprotected."

"Oh, he didn't have to stay for so long, and on today of all days."

"I think he preferred sitting in here than attending memorials and events all evening," Bill replies. He drops his head onto Fleur's arm, the weight of it warm and comforting, so his next words are muffled, "Fleur, I'm so proud of you,” but she hears them.

And she's had people saying this to her all day but hearing it from Bill, the man who has come through everything with her, has her smiling, a happy sigh following. “I am too,” she replies, hand reaching for his.

When Bill smiles at her the way he does now, tired but eyes shining so much Fleur can’t look away, the scars that mar his face are unnoticeable, but they are yet another reminder that they have live through the war and come out the other side less whole and innocent than they were before. But now they have this tiny little person, half Bill, half Fleur, and with another few things mixed in, and she’s a symbol of the hope and happiness that will follow.

Now, with her husband and her baby beside her, Fleur slides further under the sheets and allows herself to fall asleep.

 

 


End file.
